An anecdote about making music on the street

On my way back from the supermarket around the corner just now, I saw a girl on the sidewalk of about 7 years old, who was standing there with a brightly-colored toy keyboard around her neck and what was probably her brother next to her.
As I passed them, the girl politely asked me if I was interested in making a deal with her. She would play a song on her keyboard for me: If I liked it, I could make a contribution of 50 cents towards piano lessons for her. If I didn’t like it, I didn’t need to give anything. (In case I didn’t understand her, or forgot what I was doing or why I was there later, the whole deal was summarized on a piece of paper held up by her brother.)

I accepted her offer. She then explained that she was playing everything herself except for the drum track. Then she played her song, holding the keyboard upside down. I kinda liked it, but then I listen to some weird music. I don’t want to denigrate the musical skills of a 7 year old, but I could tell why she wanted lessons. Still, it could have been a lot worse – she could have been playing a violin, for instance.

When I said I liked it and gave her a Euro (a whole Euro), she shyly pointed out that I only needed to give 50 cents.

All together now: awwwwwwww.

In related news: the Washington Post asked one of the top violinists in the world to play his Stradivarius in a metro station in Washington DC during rush hour, to see if people would react. You can read about it here (article via Kottke).

This was all pretty wholesome. Or maybe the techniques have gotten better. This was in the Czerningasse by the way.

My Xbox Live gamertag is CousinDupree, because a) I like Steely Dan, and b) Xbox Live is a godforsaken bureaucratic nightmare from hell, and wouldn’t allow me to use my stale Xbox 1 Live tag (Godwhacker, also a Steely Dan reference) on the Xbox 360. Bah! I have only turned on my Xbox 360 once in the last 6 months or so though…